Fair Play

Walter tole him right after Hamish´s funeral that he is finished with. Trixie had only laughed to that. We wereńt violent sort of guys, at least not the way you see on a telly day in day oot but he´d flushed a career of four good lads... Walter of course wis, is and will be. Heś eternal the way world itself is and he´ll be along in 200 million years when the universe as we noo it seizes to exist. Maybe it already has.

We were doped like ten monkeys. There wisńt a chance we´d done it with our minds clearń sober. Not a chance.
Right Manager, said Rippe with a voice unusually hushed for him. Why You think we´re here right noo? Trixie swallowed. He wis scared alright. The shit wis hitting the fan big time. Rippe had suggested earlier on that maybe we should get ourselves – just for the sake of it – some cricket-bats and chains and big guerilla-knives just to see Trixie shitting himself. Not a single nerve moving Walter tole him that when we are aboot to finish this crap, he is going to do it for sure. Case closed.

Trixies screames came to me like a heard of wild rhinos roaming in a savanna, hushed in the worlds biggest super-silencer, then like a butterflies wings audible in a slow motion. Pshh, then one, two, three, four second gap. Pshh...It could be that he said something. Begged us. Had he promised us all of the god damn gold of king Solomon himself hadńt that changed a freakin´thing.

I wis gigglin´like a wee boy and a old bird whos laughs are blended in one in a molecule-blender of a sort. Bloody wee cock-teaser she wis. Oh she wis in age alright. I´d tole her straight to that pretty face of hers that please let me see the passport, please. Or a student ID in case passport proves to be difficult to produce. She could get her discount fare all the way back to Dumfries easier then anyway. Thatś, judgin´ her accent, where i thought she wis from anyway. You don´t say. Twenty years of age and everythin´and her birthday bein´only two days off Amandas. Another bloody pisces. She wis goin´ through ma bag makin´comments on everything, tellin´ that twelve raincoats wis way too many for me. I tole her that those are not the last to be found, around here somewhere should be another truck-load or so and when i´m done with her, boy, they will all be used and discarded the way bald middle-aged Suffolk-squire wankers go with homeless Thai lads.
There i wis, sittin´ and thinkin wether or not have another hit. I wis alright but what the hell. So i wis groovin there, high like a good-damn voodoo-priest and it wis Trixies screams back in ma head again. Pshh..., one, two, three, four. Pshh...

Manager of a big club disappearing on a broad daylight is a major head-line of course. They might start suspecting us, then-again, they may not. Of the four lads doin´ Trixie only Rippe´d been sacked, but it´d take a bloody inspector Rebus to get the number four out of this puzzle for he´d been back in top playin for Dundee not even two weeks after. But Trixie´d flushed a career of a four superb lads just like that and me and Walter were sure that this is why it all happened to Hamish the miserable way it did.

So anyway this bloody bird managed to find me the week after. Chekin´oot ma flat, tellin´me that this wis a proper place only for a puff or a guy desperate enough to shoot himself. She seemed to aprecciate the books hooever, for she stood there a good full ten minutes. Pickin´one up every noo and then, hummin´almost inaudibly. I knoo for i wis timin´! I wis givin´her the beans, then for some reason, got angry and tole her to blow it. She wis naturally holdin´ her stand askin´me if that wis the athlete-boys´ testosteron finally boilin´over. Askin´me if i´d hit many lasses. I answered that if she carries on like that she may very well be the first to find oot. Then relieved she started laughin, as did i, but the butterfly spreadin´ itś wings wis still in ma head even after i´d realised that sheś in fact one hell of a lass and a smart one too; the birthday bein´ two days off Amandas or not.

I didńt want to sit next to her, but Andy´d tole me that he needed to sort out some stuff with Lynn. He saw me through alright. He became ma pimp for he knew that i won´t be the one makin´a move. Won´t ma arse. Cocaine or not, i wis scared stiff, ma mouth bein´dry as a bone.
She wis bein´ nice to me. Surprisingly so, pushin´ her thigh next to mine. Chattin´ givin me the odd look here and then. The whole she bang. Thatś hoo they get yer arse, man. I wis havin´ this Johnnie Travolta ambience. The Pulp Fiction kind of thing. Whatś the score there. The tin with the coke wis size of a water-bucket, so had all the top-floor arseholes along the wanker-friends of theirs been keen, they´d all be rocketed out of atmosphere.
Back in Andys i had a fag in his back yard and when i decided to go in she´d changed the thing. She wis lookin to me as if i´d offered her a week-old codfish to eat, as if there wis twenty thousand light years keepin´us apart and not a single starship in whole god-damn galaxy.
In the mornin´, havin another fag i found that bloody rose too. She´d not even taken it oot the cover. It wis dead and faded the way that lass couldńt possibly be had the millennia passed.
Andy tole me that i should wait. The last boyfriend of hers had been a wanker and she in fact really likes me. Just give her some time man! Go slow! What the fuckin ever.When you, Andy, big-shot ladys-man are telling me to wait, i´ll wait. But not much longer than the next Christmas to come.
When you are tellin´ me to give her time, fine, you got it man but not longer than until ma forty fifth birthday for I want this lass into ma life more than I wanted anything in ma whole damn life. Not just to screw her, that of course too. Into ma life. To be ma woman. I´d make her those bloody babies if thatś what she wants. Any bloody day bro. Any bloody day.

It wis the fourth of april the week after, precisely forty two minutes short of tea-time when I tole Trixie i´ll walk. What did I mean with that? It means that i´ll wash ma hands of this. I have enough. Finito Trixie. I don´t want to hit the ball with ma right foot anymore. Or the left one for that matter, and please, get used to it for ma decision is final. Whos gonna play instead? Hoo the hell do i knoo. You´re the manager, you figure it oot. Put Soren in if you like. Just for a sheer fun I might play a year odd in some tinymight team to keep ma body goin´, but no premiership for me, thank you very much. I´m no Georgie Best, Trixie, and amen to that.
Hoo dare you callin´me a piece of shit, Trixie, me Homo Sapiens Sapiens of a best sort and quality! There are whispers that you were smart enough to fix yerself a master-with-honours diploma from London Uni and noo look at ye, arguein´here like a good damn Thori.
Well, to be honest with there wisńt much of an argument anyways. He knew I wis dead serious and wis just tryin´to keep hes pants on. And had he not two months later screwed it all up the way he did, he might have kept them on all the way along.

Bought the Guardian on ma way doon Leith Walk. Not a word aboot Trixie MacPhearson. Few punks had stashed a wee sikh-lad on Sloanś, cuttin´his hair off too and noo the Sikhs were mad as a pope before bangin´a cardinal and declared revenge.
Not a single word aboot Angus “Trixie” MacPhearson getting´lost or bein´found dead. MacPhearson? MacPhearson, whoś da guy? Oh well, nuftin´much these days i´m afraid. This is da guy who brought Gretna FC out of horse-shit to premiership within three odd years then turned into a wanker and me, Walter, Rippe and Paul did him and noo his slimy body is restin´in a bush of Thistles in a place I won´t be tellin´. Hes carś in a bottom of a smallish but darn deep lake near Loch Lomond and if you really need to noo then it wis Rippe and Paul who did the real job. Walter did the plannin´thing and I wis the chauffer which makes me as guilty as us all and really I don´t give a damn.

Could be that it wis for that silly article that I found maself on Sloan street. As I wis already there I decided i´ll go and say hello to ma pal Jane´. Winkie-winkie Jane. Hoo is it goin´? Hooś yer boyfriend or is it girlfriend just noo for i´ll be damned if I could ever spot a pattern in her choice of partners. Alright who is it then. A lad. Oh, jolly good then.
Janeś flat is a real piece of work. When I get embarrassed of mine i´ll just go and take a look of hers. Sheś five years my senior but nevertheless parties like a twenty year old. Slammin´doon sambuccas and Swedish vodka and as sheś a hefty lass carrin´it oot pretty well. Mixin´it with cannabis or cocaine or whatever happens to be her drug of a choice of that particular night.

I must have mentioned her this sikh-lad and as always she knew the real story which is more than those respected journalist-folks with The Guardian and The Times combined. What ever wis goin´on in Leith she knew. If I wis a dumb-fuck journalist with this Guardian-rag i´d use her one bloody hundred per cent as a source any given day. So, Jane who happens to be a part time social worker as well tole me that there wis no fight at all. Just the sikhy-boy cuttin´his hair for heś one depressed attention-sick laddy whos folks won´t let him go oot with this Scottish lass. And noo all the 10000 sikhs of Edinburgh are pissed off like Tony before elections and swearin´revenge and if they wereńt one fairly civilized punch they would, too. And as always, she wis right aboot that.

Hamish never quite came oot of this. I mean, he went on practicin´but he wis a marked man. If thereś anythin´i´m sure of then it is that Hamish had nothin´what-so-ever to do with the fixin´-thing, not more than Charlie fuckin´Babbit with breakin-oot world war two, but somehoo they found the bettin´-odds in his flat and as it happened Gretna and Rosenborg bein´ all over it, too and that wis that. The committee said that at least for this season heś done with. So They had found their bloody scape-goat, and It seemed that this wis good enough for the blood-hounds in the the committe
And me, walter, Rippe and Paul decided that even tho´ noone tole Hamish to get himself killed on his way to Inverness, drivin´his Lotus drunk as a skunk, wis it still Trixies doin´for by then we had all the loose straps tied up.

I got back from Oban just when Andy had another one of his parties. I remember pretty much only two things of it. One of his barman-friends throwin´ Andys electric piano oot of the window and more importantly things finally started to move with me and Amanda. For once we just talked without any gibberish and withot cocaine bein´involved. I think I only had one drink and then drove her home. We talked in the car for a short while and then she went upstairs. I made a stop on my way home and had a kebab in one of the dodgy take-away place and must have yelled something out of sheer happiness for the owner gave me dirty- and possibly scared looks. I couldńt have cared less because I knew that after all that time I had got her. And I couldńt have been happier had I emptied The Royal Treasury.

We had spent a week or two in Lake district after i´d got my last salary from the club and then another week in the isle of Man and I started to realize that it wis one huge mistake altogether. We had our moments but it become obvious that not even all those bloody English ponies and lakes and shampagne with breakfast won´t do for long. There wis this endless idiotic ping-pong goin´on between me and her. I carefully decided not to tell Andy about it cos´he wis really proud about his project, probably considerin´it the biggest achievement since winnin´the world cup in sixty six.

I had no idea what time it wis or hoo long had we been there. Not even if Trixie wis really dead or wis that monstorous grin on his face just some cramp preceding his death, an attempt to tell us something from between this world and the other where he, for sure, given his stylish arrival wis a big shot by now.
I am not entirely sure hoo we got his body in a trunk and made our way towards Loch Lomond. I have no memories whatsoever of how Walter and Paul got him out of there and started up the hill both breathing heavily under the bulky burden. I have just random images, a sixteen-wheeler I wis about to hit doing eighty, wipers moving nervously like rats in a lab. One of very few conchious moments wis when Trixies Volvo hit a rock with its bottom, however I have detailed picture of how after a moment of keeping itself steady as if not being sure what to do the Volvo turned itself in 180 degrees and then just disappeared into the dark and unpleasent green water.

We threw everything into fire. Our clothes, shoes, absolutely everything, We were stark naked and cleaned ourselves in the very lake we´d drowned Trixie and heaven knows – would have drowned all our memories about that night and that person ever bein´among us, bein´our friend.
We sat in Walters Landy and drove back to Edinburgh, I don´t think we spoke with each other. We had everything planned, everything sorted. Every bloody detail had been discussed so many times that we´d been able to tell the story even when comatosed with a pint of 12-year old McAllan. And should they somehow get to us or even one of us then good luck to them provin´a thing and for a start they should go and find Trixie from those bushes heś rottin´just noo. Even the nearest Bothy wis a good three miles away. As much as we know it that wis it. MacPhearson? MacPhearson, well officer, sir, let me think, oh itś some good six weeks I last saw that lad. And so thorough had our preparation been that even that darn Pinocchio syndrome had we practiced so that Paulie would have cut off his own willie rather than liftin´his finger to his nose.

In its own funny way it had become a tradition. The lass just appeared out of thin air at random day and at random time and naturally without givin´a warnin. She´d become less bully or wis it that i´d got used to it. In those hours it wis when I managed to get myself oot of the letargie where my alcohol-induced brain had sucked me in.

Trixie You bastard, leave me alone, you are dead. Because if you don´t i´ll rip yer bloody ears off when we meet next. Pshh…one, two, three, four. Pshh…